h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

Loonytunes woke up on the morning of December 25 and his comely partner leaned over and kissed him passionately on the lips. "Steady on," he remarked, sensitive to the possibility that he might not taste or smell so good on account of the fact he had got chooked as a goose the previous night at the Cosmopolitan Club. But she sniffed, lasciviously, and this excellent fellow paused to realise that his expected hangover and appalling state of physical disrepair were absent. Unmentionable things happened.

Three minutes later - his stamina was the stuff erotic legend - he remarked that he was hungry. Soon enough, he was served a choice of crayfish, salmon, bacon, scrambled eggs, toasted white bread, a bowl of cucumber and radishes in vinegar with lots of salt at the ready, peaches, tea, beer, and a jellytip iceblock. "Delicious," he announced and, resting his head, slept the bloated sleep of the just.

He roused himself before noon. The day was as bright as genius; sunshine oiled his bare, barrel-shaped chest. His handsome cat at his side, Loonytunes decided on a stroll around his estate. The creek was at high tide but he could see through the sparkling waters and gaze upon the gambolling eels, the round oysters, the old trouts. Herons roosting on top of the mangroves caught his eye and returned his nod "Morning," he called to them, but a passing jogger, a rich 24-year-old Swedish gymnast called Ava Meontoast, assumed his greeting was meant for her, and her heart leapt in her pert breast. She had always desired Loonytunes.

A man in tune with the elements, he looked at the angle of her shadow and knew it was 12.36pm - his game of soccer would start very soon. "I may be a bit rusty on account of the fact I hung up my boots 22 seasons ago," he worried, but turned up at the local park and yielded to tearful requests that he take up a position as midfield supremo. A gasp went up as he tackled Cruyff deep in his own half, and waltzed through despairing lunges to finally unleash a fulminating left-foot screamer from a distance of 30 yards. It shredded the back of the net like a bullet in the breast of a fowl; Eusebio, di Stefano and Best smiled to see the majestic Loonytunes once more impose his will on the game.

Afterwards, relaxing in the team bath, he was approached by Graham Greene, who asked for his autograph. "of course," said Loonytunes. "But would you mind awfully if I told you how I thought The Power and the Glory might be written in a more vivid manner?" Greene tore off his clothes there and then and joined Loonytunes in the tub. Only mentionable things happened - Loonytunes dictated, Greene rewrote eight chapters. "Much better," Gabriel Garcia Marquez in the Times later noted.

A visit to a money machine threatened to wipe his mood. "Insufficient funds," it said, and then calculated that he was $29,015.50 in overdraft. But this even-tempered colossus took it in his stride. He simply went to work that afternoon, he mowed lawns, washed cars and healed the sick, earning enough to shout all his closest friends and various fawning acolytes - Mark, Shazz, Pastey, Anna, Ashley, Abi, Peta, Jim, even poor old Wowbagger - to a restaurant dinner. Instead, though, the great man donated his money to the City Mission.

Returning home, it struck Loonytunes that he had stopped smoking. "That was easy," he commented to himself, his back as straight as an ironing board, his face glowing like a powerful lightbuib. He lit a barbecue in his backyard and piled on steaks, chops and chooks. He was a stickler for feasting on a balanced diet.

In the cool of the evening, he turned his eager, well-hung mind to whether he had passed his life so far in a meaningful fashion, and if his celebrated h2g2 page was actually any good. He turned over the back pages of his existence and saw that he was much fulfilled. He had made the right decisions, the right sentence constructions; guilt, shame, despair, longing, and deep, wretched anxieties were complete strangers on the shore of his well being; marvellously, he harboured no delusions.

"Time for your special present, darling," purred his kittenish wife, as Loonytunes, that old dog, made his way to bed. "Thank you, my pet," he growled, and fell to his knees. Mystical, sainted, holy, he prayed for world peace and an end to hunger, and then brushed his teeth and drank a lot of beer.

He dreamed long into the night. There was no end to the fantastical images that delighted his subconscious- a goose on a seesaw, Ava Meontoast on a seesaw, a conversation with God in which Loonytunes was asked to mind the shop, his brutal slayings of everyone who he had ever hated, beautiful flowers at his feet and doughnuts in the sky. He woke up on Boxing Day with a sore head, and it was pissing down outside.

L'Toons!
I am both proud and humbled by that piece. Makes my prose look vulgar and simple by comparison (not hard admittedly).
Have the Yule of your dreams O Looneytunes!
signed
Poor Old Wowbagger

Gosh Loony! You certainly live life to the full... that Bungee jump on your 50th birthday obviously did the trick
Here... have a , a chaser and raise a glass to toast friends both old and new
I will be eating Indonesian food on Christmas Day... not quite the kind of fare I'm used to... but there will still be a plenty
A Very Happy Christmas to my favourite Antipodeans
shazz

I presume you meant to include me in that group Shazz

I most certainly DID Linus
Here... have one of the brilliant English 's which my bro sent me for Christmas... this one is Old Peculiar... probably how you are feeling right now! ROFL
shazz

I resemble that remark...

I don't usually make new years resolutions, but:

I will try and actually write a regular article for the Post, some guide entries, update my homepage and even visit the peer review pages...

I should be able to break all those fairly quickly i would have thought

Setting yourself up for a fall I reckon there Linus.
Hey Shazz! You're back! Hope you had a good Christmas!

Doh, I can't believe i put all that in writing...

Hi there Wowbagger... yes I had a great time thanx
I will send you the photo's asap... they aren't great... I think that my scanner is on a go-slow!
Linus... I will hold you to that... let us see how long I have to wait for an article before we mark you as failed though! LOL
shazz

I meant to do one this week of course...I'm thinking of interviewing some reasonably famous people during the year, tell them i'm from the Post blah,blah,blah... and see if they respond.

Where are those press passes btw...

Hehehe... I'll have to ask Amy the Ant if she can design some for us... I believe that Pastey made one a few months ago for the British Beer Festival and actually had a little luck using it! ROFL
I'm working on the Back Issue page atm... and if you search long and hard enough you may find all your previous articles... although I tried looking for h2g2 Life and it didn't spring up on the 1st, 2nd or 3rd page of results! Hmmmm...
Who are these reasonably famous people anyway? Will I have actually heard of them? ROFL
shazz

I should be able to get Tashi Tenzing - Tenzing Norgays grandson, Andrew Blades (ex - wallaby), possibly Brett Lee (Cricketer) or his brother Shane, some musos, the current governor of NSW...

This is why i need to know if the Guide is happy for me to say i work for their official online newspaper, etc

Hi Linus

Yes it would be fine to say that you are writing for the Official h2g2 Community Newspaper. If the people you are trying to interview would like to contact me by email, then I'll confirm your Post Reporter status, and the legitimacy of the h2g2 website, as the official Guide. How does that sound?

My email address is [email protected]

There you go Linus... you are officially recognised
shazz

Oh dear...i really am running out of excuses now ROFL

Thank you Peta

Thank you Shazz